The present invention relates to a socket-type connector for flat cables or, more particularly, to a connector for flat cables capable of connecting flat cables with high reliability, resistance against corrosion and stability against mechanical shocks and vibrations.
There are known various types of connectors for flat cables on the market. Each of them has a basic structure comprising a plug part for fixing the end of the flat cable to a lead wire and a jack part which serves to receive the lead wire and fix it to a substrate plate or circuit board with electric connection. Since the electric connection is obtained by thrusting this jack part into a socket made of an insulator and conductor, certain inconveniences are unavoidable when it is desired to electrically connect a multiplicity of terminal contact points with each other. Furthermore, such a connector is usually expensive because the parts of metal should be imparted with anti-corrosiveness by plating with gold or the like precious metal and the structure thereof is very complicated while the performance of such a connector is not always satisfactory sometimes with troubles in connection.
On the other hand, an alternative method is already well known in which the electric connection between a connecting part of an electrode assembly having a large number of contact points and a substrate plate having a large number of electroconductive stripes corresponding to the contact points is established through an anisotropically electroconductive sheet having electroconductive fibers oriented in a matrix of an insulating material in the direction of the thickness of the sheet. When such a method is applied to the electric connection of flat cables, however, there is a disadvantage that, when the insulating material at the end portion of the flat cable has been removed to expose the metal-made cable wires for electric connection, cross contact of the wires may take place so that no exact one-to-one connection can be obtained between each of the cable wires and one of the electrodes on the substrate plate corresponding thereto.